I AM a 15-year-old student and I feel compelled to express my feelings about the people who shaped my education.
Today, all everyone talks about is technology, health and exercise, job prospects and social media. While that is all very important, I think it’s time someone mentioned the people who are responsible for our success.
There are so many professions in the world today, such as doctors, lawyers, engineers, and these are all very highly regarded. However, to me, the most important profession in the world – one that is overlooked and doesn’t get the respect it deserves – is teaching.
 So many of my teachers went beyond the call of duty, to ensure each and every child’s success, both the weak and the strong. My Music teacher used to stay up all night helping us with our compositions although he had a family to take care of. |
People often don’t realise that without the lessons, without the education, no one would learn anything – there would be no growth, no progress, no doctors, no lawyers, no anything at all. When you really think about it, teachers are the foundation of our future generation and they should be appreciated and never forgotten. They say a doctor saves a person’s life but, more than that, a teacher starts a student’s life – how else could we get to where we are today? Without teachers, there would be no transfer of knowledge or new theories, and the world would be stuck.
They don’t need to care for us or worry about our success; what do we matter to them? Their lives are already sorted out, yet they still go to such lengths to ensure our success and sometimes this is not acknowledged, which is unfair. We neglect the people who serve us with pride and dignity and, because we don’t care enough to know them, we take them for granted and they become forgotten. There are exceptions, but they are not who I’m writing about.
So many of my teachers went beyond the call of duty, to ensure each and every child’s success, both the weak and the strong. My Music teacher used to stay up all night helping us with our compositions although he had a family to take care of.
My Geography teacher used to stay back till late for any student who needed help, to make sure that we could stand on our own two feet, and she spent hours talking to students who had problems.
My Biology teacher often gave up her break time to help me understand what I failed to at first. None of them needed to go to such lengths, yet they did.
I notice that nowadays the respect students once had for teachers has disappeared, as they are too caught up in their own lives, although there are the rare few who take the time to acknowledge their teachers’ efforts.
Many believe that their success is all the result of their own efforts, which I find appalling because without the basic foundation our teachers have given us, we would all be struggling. If teachers didn’t share their knowledge and skills with us, we’d know nothing.
A real hero is someone who does the right thing when it isn’t easy. It isn’t always easy to yell at your students when they aren’t putting in the effort, or to put on a smile each day when you know of all the horrible things your students say about you.
To date, I have never seen a single teacher give up on their students, no matter how harsh or hurtful they may be.
My teachers did not limit their lessons to the classroom but also taught me life lessons. I was taught by my teachers to always believe in myself, never give up, that we are all unique in our own ways so to always be myself even if it doesn’t fit into society’s expectations.
Apart from my mother and grandmother, all the success I achieve in my future will be dedicated to my teachers.
